Burrillville’s Tyler Seddon, 7, prepares for marrow transplant in his fight against leukemia

Tyler Seddon, the 7-year-old Burrillville boy fighting cancer who captured the hearts of first responders and military members who traveled from all over the country to celebrate his birthday in March,...

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By
Tatiana Pina
Posted May. 29, 2014 @ 12:01 am

Tyler Seddon, the 7-year-old Burrillville boy fighting cancer who captured the hearts of first responders and military members who traveled from all over the country to celebrate his birthday in March, entered Tufts Medical Center on Friday to prepare for his bone marrow transplant Monday.

Tyler’s mother, Rachel Seddon-Dunn, said that the perfect bone marrow donor was not found, but that the family did get a match from a cord blood bank.

Seddon-Dunn said her son is required to be at the Floating Hospital for Children at Tufts Medical Center 10 days prior for conditioning for the transplant of cord blood, which includes days of chemotherapy and radiation. Seddon-Dunn said Tyler was sick from the radiation.

Tyler has had two bouts with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. He is cancer free, his mother says, but he needs the transplant to stay in remission.

A cord blood transplant is a hematopoietic (blood) stem cell transplant that uses cord blood instead of bone marrow or peripheral blood as the source of blood-producing stem cells for the transplant.

The transplant restores a patient’s ability to produce healthy blood cells, some of which are essential to the immune system’s ability to fight infections. Cord blood is in the placenta and umbilical cords of newborn babies and is collected after birth.

Tyler and his battle with leukemia touched first responders from all over the country when his mother, a volunteer firefighter for the Pascoag Fire District, posted his wish to get birthday cards from first responders on Facebook. The posting went viral. He received messages and videos on Facebook from first responders and military members from all over the world and so many gifts that Seddon-Dunn had to a rent storage unit to keep them in. A birthday party was planned for March 6.